Worship of the sun is one of mankind's oldest beliefs and perhaps in many ways one of the most sensible too. For the sun is the literal source of life. All energy conversions - whether in plants, animal or in fuel sources - are, after all, utilizing the rays of the sun at a few removes. Life would come to an end without photosynthesis and what is that but drawing nourishment for the world from the sun? 400 million years from now we are slated to fall back into the decaying star that our planet had burst out of eons ago, though by then mankind will have to learn to find another source of life, perhaps under other stars. Till now the sun is indispensable and has been instinctively reverenced as such. The Pueblo Hopi Indians have a daily ritual which they claim nourishes the sun and keeps it, and by implication, the world alive. Anthropologists have indulgently regarded it as a charming oddity, instead of the intrinsically wise awareness that it manifests. They know where Life comes from only too well; they merely focus on a preliminary stage in its unfolding sequence.

In India, the Sun is still worshipped on a daily basis by at least tens of millions of people and that would be a conservative estimate. The chanting of mantras to greet the sun at dawn is one of the really genuine ancient living traditions of the world. The sun god, called Surya, has risen and fallen in prominence over the centuries, but his worship has not dwindled even though his stature has. From Vedic times onwards Surya has always been worshipped. In the Vedas, he is the chief source of light and warmth and wisdom, though he is often co-mingled with Aditya and Savitri in a manner that does not resolve itself until many centuries later. As mythology developed, the great Vedic gods were declared to be sons of Aditi, wife of Kashyapa, and they were collectively known as the Adityas. It is a name that is applied almost exclusively to Surya today and is a very popular name for males. Savitri has now become an exclusively female name, though in the Vedas it originally meant the invisible, hence spiritual aspect, of the sun. This is analogous to the concept of Helios, the invisible sun in Greek myth. Others say Savitri is the sun at full blaze and Surya the sun which rises and sets. Clearly this interpretation has fallen out of favor.

The most sacred mantra in all Hinduism, the Gayatri, is addressed to the Sun, Vivifier, "the one who enlightens and stimulates the understanding." There is no great body of myth as such associated with the sun, it is almost as if Surya is such a visible and even hotly tangible presence that there was no need to nourish the imagination with word pictures and long tales. The Vedic hymns are full of descriptions of his appearance, but they are more enthusiastic exclamations at the brilliant beauty of the sun than anything else. It is as though they were not blinded but drunk on light, bedazzled with illumination.

The sun is golden haired, golden limbed and, interesting touch, golden tongued. His eyes are golden orbs through which he regards the world and gives him his name - Loka-chakshuh, the Eye of the World. If these names sound like titles from a Robert Jordan fantasy epic, that cannot be helped. The mythical imagination always runs in predictable grooves no matter if it is 2000BC or 2000AD.

Surya rides across the sky in a golden chariot drawn by seven white horses, personifications of the days of the week. The solar chariot is the oldest hypothesis to explain the apparent movement of the sun across the sky. The wheels of his chariot naturally have twelve spokes for the obvious reasons. His charioteer is an interesting personage called Aruna. This worthy is translucent and is an undifferentiated mass of flesh under the waist and sitting down on the job is about all he can do, but that is perfect for this task. When the dawn breaks, personified as a beautiful woman called Ushas, Surya is supposed to give chase to her. His light shines through the translucent body of Aruna and that is why we have the Red Sun, Rohita, visible in the morning. The rays of the sun are described as the many arms of Surya reaching out to bless every corner of the universe and infusing the realms of the gods with energy.

In later mythology, Surya is demoted somewhat. He is now a still powerful god, but less than the Trinity. This, by the way, was not reflected in popular belief. The cult of Surya grew steadily until it had rivaled any of the gods and it reached a magnificent peak between the ninth to the thirteenth centuries. The most beautiful temples in India were built for his worship, a roll-call of spectacular workmanship, the jewel-like wonder at Modhera, the awesome Konark, the totally ruined temple of Martand, the little one at Osian and perhaps many more, lost forever to iconoclastic fervor. It is as though the creative energies of India had a high in northern India with Sun temples and then sank in exhaustion. Strangely enough, the Suryavanshi Rajput warrior clans of Rajasthan, claiming descent from the sun never built a single temple for him. They worshiped other gods even though they were very proud of such noble descent. Go figure.